


Always With You

by bythegrace



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-12
Updated: 2016-05-12
Packaged: 2018-06-07 21:44:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6825646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bythegrace/pseuds/bythegrace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm tired of seeing our friends ripped apart from each other. That can’t happen to us again. I won’t let it."</p><p>"Then we won’t let it."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always With You

“All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one: you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone”― Jane Austen, Persuasion

 

Present Day:

She reaches for the special tea, the one in the orange tin with the delicate filigree that she had purchased in London last year. If ever there was cause for a special tea, one’s own 85th birthday might be an adequate occasion.

She sees a glimpse of her reflection in the kitchen window.  Although she still feels ever herself, she is once more caught off-guard by the swift passage of time. Her figure is still slim, her shoulders still straight, but her dark tresses have since given way to a snowy white chignon. The perfect vision she had prided herself in her youth is long gone; half spectacles now a permanent fixture on her face. But all in all she is lucky to have aged as well as she had, not that it had mattered over much to her of course. She hadn’t cared about looking beautiful in ages. She was content to look well groomed, civilized.

She straightens her blouse absently, and she smiles at the thought of how it had gotten mussed. She had had dinner with both her girls and their boys, a wonderful surprise that still managed to bring a smile to her face. Her daughters were grandmothers in their own rights and they lived close enough to her facility that they saw her regularly; but it was less and less frequent that they and their whole families were able to meet altogether. But tonight both Mellie and Maria’s children were able to join them for dinner and it had been lovely beyond measure to see almost all of her grandchildren together again. She sighs at the thought that it might very well be the last time she sees them all in one place.

She had done the biologic modeling and she had already beat the odds by two years, it was unlikely that she would live to see another birthday, making this one particularly bittersweet. Her girls had both walked her to the door of her small apartment and like they had been want to do as children, embraced simultaneously, the three of them linked in a warm, symmetric embrace.

Yet, all in all 85 years was nothing to lament. It was after all far longer than far better men and women than her had lived long enough to enjoy.

The thought as always leads her eyes to the hallway where all her photos stand at attention, many of the faces fixed in perpetual youth and vigor. She is one of the few who lived to see her hair go grey. She walks past the photos, her fingers lingering on dear Daisy, who had perished when still practically a child. Of brave Mack, too stoic for his own good. Of Coulson and May, who mercifully were never parted, one never left behind, taken together in the Second Siege. A genuine smile tugs at her lips when she sees the most recent photo of Hunter and Bobbi, the two of them still madly in love, celebrating their Fortieth (or 51st if you asked Hunter) wedding anniversary aboard the Queen Anne. 

Her hand curls around her tea and she knows she is delaying the inevitable, her feet dragging. She just doesn’t think she can bear it if he isn’t…

But he is, of course. His head bent over the most recent Scientific America, a rare annual commemorative paper issue balanced over his knees.

“You came,” she whispers

He looks up, and she wonders how anyone could ever think blue a cold color, his smile is like the warming rays of the sun. As always the sight of him loosens the tension in her shoulders.

“Have I missed one in the past, oh 70 odd years?” he asks with the barest hint of a smile.

“No, never,” she replies as she slips into her favorite chair across from him, perhaps it’s her favorite because it is across from where he is always want to sit, she hasn’t teased that apart quite yet.

“You look lovely as ever,” he says, his voice low and ever so sincere.

The thought brings a tiny prick of tears to her eyes. In a fit of vanity many years ago she had asked him if he felt it odd, to see her age as he stayed ever much the same.  He had laughed as replied that seeing her age felt perfectly natural. It was his own fixed youth that felt odd and irregular.

“It’s a marvel isn’t it,” she says of the issue on his lap, “Imagine….”

“Two of our designs ranking amongst the 100 most consequential inventions of the millennia, Aye…it is a bloody marvel alright,” he says with a laugh, “All thanks to you,” he says nodding towards her.

“They were principally your designs….”

“That you recognized as being worthy of production and improvement amongst hundreds of duds” he replies quickly. It is of course not the first time they’ve had this discussion. They trade the credit and praise for their work between them like a lending library. “Did you have a nice evening?” he asks with genuine interest.

“It was magnificent,” she says her voice replete with the knowledge that between them two it is word of highest praise, “The girls…they’re a marvel Fitz, I hadn’t…”

“Of course they are, you’re their mother after all,” his praise genuine.

“They aren’t girls anymore though, and their sons are men with children of their own. I’ve kept them from their lives for long enough” she replies with a bit of a frown.

“Seeing you isn’t a sacrifice, they adore you.” He says, his voice seemingly incredulous that anyone alive could find spending time with her a chore.

She waves off his statement with the flick of a hand, “Oh I know that, I simply meant…I don’t worry about leaving them as I used to, they have lives to live in their retirement, grandchildren to raise, foreign lands to see.”

“But they’ll miss you,” he says it with a finality that draws her attention.

“Fitz?” she asks softly, their unspoken communication having only matured over the years, so much so that a flicker of his eyelid can speak volumes to her now.

“You don’t recall it then?” he asks softly, closing the volume on his lap gently. “I came last night, you were already asleep…and I kissed your forehead,” he closes his own eyes at the thought of delivering news to her that might be painful, “You felt it. You turned and reached for me. And when our hands touched, I could feel you too, faintly but I could hold your hand in my own.”

She digests the information silently, its import immediately obvious to her. In that illogical way that one’s mind works when confronted with life changing news, she muses silently that she was pleased she’d had the apartment cleaned this morning and that she had the chance to see Simon’s baby this evening.

She stirs her tea slowly, and when she looks up at him, her eyes shimmer with tears that are at once hopeful and nostalgic, “You have been seeming more corporeal in form of late,” she says with a laugh in her voice.

“You’re not upset?” he asks softly.

“No, I mean of course, yes in a way…it’s always frightening as a mother to leave your children behind. But I couldn’t ask for them to be better settled, or wish for any greater happiness for them…”

“Are you afraid,” he asks rising and coming to sit at her knee.

“No,” she says with a slow shake of her head, “I’m not afraid to leave this life behind…not in the least” she stops then when the desire to touch him becomes too great. She gingerly reaches her hand to brush against his cheek, the roughness she feels beneath her fingers causing her to gasp. “Oh Fitz,” she says, her voice nearly a sob of relief and joy.

He leans into her touch, closing his eyes at the sensation.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

59 years prior

The room is dark when she opens her eyes, but wildly she wishes for a perpetual night. The clothes feel rough against her skin and she feels unnatural, as if being alive is all wrong. She feels too empty to have a beating heart. She’s too drained of every emotion to imagine her cells continuing to divide, for gas to continue to exchange in her lungs. How can her body keep on living when she feels completely dead?

It seems too cruel to be real, to be ripped apart again. For him to be gone forever. But in her heart she knows it to be true. Despite being locked away in the sick bay, she knows it the moment he dies. She feels it in the marrow of her bones.

But when she looks up she sees something in the corner of her room, it’s faint…

“Fitz?” she asks her voice shaking. Her mind races, its madness and likely she’s hallucinating…

“Jemma,” he says rising from his corner of the room, “You can see me?”

“Oh My God,” she whispers softly, “Are…are…are you real? Is this some form of hallucination?” she speaks so quietly that she’s whispering almost to herself. But when she looks up she feels wild, her long devotion to science, to reason evaporating in the face of the miracle of having him again. “I don’t care,” she says fiercely, her voice throbbing with emotion, “I don’t care…if you’re here or in my mind or wherever. All that matters is that you’re here,” she says rising on her knees and grasping at his hands. When her hands fail to make contact, brushing through his like moving through the air, she gasps in pain.

They both look down at where their hands should have met. He’s ghostly pale, his skin a facsimile of a living body. She is still unbelievably, astonishly alive. The gulf between them seems endless and the finality of their new reality strikes them both with an intensity that brings them to their knees.

Then she’s sobbing as she hasn’t sobbed since he died. But now he’s beside her, murmuring words of love and affection, begging her forgiveness, over and over.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

55 years prior

She shuts the door and turns her back against it. The roughness of the wood reassuring against her naked skin. Her dress is elaborate and lovely in its intricacy, tiny seed pearls shimmering like an opalescent ribbon at her feet. She had loved it the moment she had seen it, but wearing it feels all wrong. It’s a garment that should reflect a hopefulness of the future, when all she longs for is the past.

Her hand moves unconsciously to her abdomen as it’s been want to do of late. She takes a shuddering breath, more to bolster herself than from any other emotion. She wills herself to be strong.

“I always knew you would be a beautiful bride,” he says from the corner of the room.

She closes her eyes, both in relief and sorrow, “You came, I wasn’t sure if you would…” She looks at him, he’s still faint but he’s Fitz and perhaps she’s always seen him better than anyone else has, but to her he’s as real as anyone in her life, more so .

“I would never have missed it,” he says rising and walking towards her, he smiles softly, “My God Jemma, you are a vision.” He stops just short of her, his eyes roaming over as if he’s memorizing her, logging all the small details of her appearance in a mental catalog. “I feel as if this is the last time I should come to you,” he says hesitantly, bracing himself for her answer.

She responds swiftly, the delight on her face at seeing him replaced by a look of sheer terror, “No, no,” the words ripped from her like a cry of anguish.

“Jemma, you’ll never move forward with me here like this,” he says with a rueful look of affection, “You need to put your life with me behind you, you’ll be a wife soon and a mum,” he said, his hand ghosting over her abdomen. “You have new people who need your love,”

“No,” she says over and over, her hands wrapped around her shoulders, “No, I can’t” she says finally with a moan. “Please, please…Fitz, I can marry someone else, I can bear his children....I can keep his house and stand by his side for the rest of my days but please, please I can’t....I can't dislodge you from my heart. You own it all, every corner…and a life without you…I’m not strong enough, I never will be,” her voice is desperation itself and her tears are flowing now as Fitz swipes at them ineffectively with ghostly fingers.

“Alright Jem, it’s alright,” he mumbles soothingly, and they stay locked in a silent, empty embrace “I made you cry on your wedding day,” he finishes ruefully.

She laughs without mirth, “It was bound to happen, better with you now than in front of everyone,” she says as she moves to sit on the floor, tears giving way to exhaustion, “You’ll promise me won’t you,” she says when he settles in next to her, “None of this again, I can bear nearly anything I think, but losing you again might end me.”

He leans back against the door, “I know it isn’t for the best, but I’ve never denied you anything before…and I don’t think I can start now.” Despite it all, his eyes are still a brilliant blue and Jemma wishes more than anything, that they could just stay like this.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

54 years prior

She’s wrong about never loving again of course.

But Fitz isn’t eventually dislodged by some tall strapping stranger. Rather one sunny day in May, two tiny pink cheeked darlings merely nudge him aside a bit in Jemma's heart. The moment they come into the world she feels the long cracked pieces of her heart start to mend, just a bit.

She’s feeding little Mariah quietly as her sister Maggie sleeps beside Jemma in her bassinet when she looks up to find him staring at them reverentially.

“They’re a marvel Jem…you’re a marvel,” he says with a smile composed of tenderness and wonder. His hand reaches out instinctively to caress the baby’s smooth brown hair, his pale fingers seeming to almost make contact with downy hair beneath.

“They’re glorious aren’t they?” she responds with decidedly un-English smugness, “This is Maggie,” she says fondling the tightly wrapped pink bundle in the adjacent bassinet, “and this is Mariah Anne,” she says gesturing to the infant in her arms before glancing up at him quickly.

“After my Mother and my Nan?” he asks quietly, his eyes unreadable.

“We had decided long ago hadn’t we?” she says, her voice equally soft.

“Oh Jemma,” his voice is rough with grief and regret,” and he is silent for a moment as his hand covers his eyes. He takes a shuddering breath before slowly returning to his normal equanimity, “What did he have to say about it?” he asks finally, his voice soft and devoid of the jealousy or bitterness that Jemma is sure she would feel if the situations were reversed.

“He says the names were fine with him, whatever I liked,” her voice is slightly brittle as she recalls his disinterest.

“Jem…I’m not a psychologist, or an expert in any human except you,” he says taking a seat next to her on her hospital bed, “But holding onto me can’t make it easy for you to let him into your life. And we both know that you aren’t the best at disguising your emotions”

“That’s not true,” at his answering laugh, she huffs softly with indignation, the baby at her breast stirring at the motion. They both chuckle softly as the infant looks quietly incensed at the interruption.

“You never knew I loved you at the Academy,” she says softly with a smirk, eager to shift the tenor of their conversation, she can’t bear to even discuss him leaving her again.

“Because you didn’t” he says with certainty.

“So says you,” she replies with nonchalance, “But I was mad for you our second year,” at his incredulous look she smiles softly “You had shot up and were just a bit taller than me then. I remember it was just before spring break and we were walking to Weaver’s class and you nudged my shoulder with yours and my heart…it just felt like it slipped into my shoes,” she says with a small shake of her head at the look of stupefaction on his face, “I got over it of course, but that isn’t to say I never thought of you that way again…although I would have denied it, did deny it in fact.”

“I never…”he begins,

“That’s why I never,” she shakes her head at the thought of their long ago mistakes. “But Fitz…I’m so glad we at least had a bit of happiness…before…”

“Jemma,” He says her name with fierceness she hasn’t heard in ages, “All of it was wonderful, all of it. You made every moment of my short, pasty little existence exceptional.”

“Ditto,” she responds softly as she thinks that he’s the answer to a question she had asked long ago.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

39 years prior…

The lights are so bright on the stage that it’s a wonder she can even read her cards. Despite her natural bravado she’s never enjoyed public speaking, and she’d always let Fitz take the lead, his affable, disaffected nature coupled with his forthright manner of speaking making him an unexpectedly charming presenter.

But he isn’t here to present now and he hasn’t been for years. And she is determined to make this presentation, the final of their 8 collaborations that she has presented posthumously, befitting of him and his legacy. She wipes her hands nervously against her jacket, and although she can’t see them, she knows the girls are there. Their father having brought them out of school for the occasion. She wishes she could see their faces, they inspire her and give her strength.

But the faces in the front seats are unfamiliar…or they are until she sees him take the chair at the end, his golden curls glinting in the light. He looks up at her and nods his head ever so slightly, as if to say “Go on then,”

She can’t help but bite down on her lip and return his nod with the tiniest one of her own before she begins.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

20 years ago……

He had been a steady presence in her increasingly chaotic life. An anchor in the storm so to speak. As her career had blossomed it had been pleasant to have someone to come home to after a long trip. Someone with whom to share the joys of their children. Another cup in the sink, another toothbrush on the counter.

Yet, she had always held the poor man at arm’s length and there he had been content to live. Their marriage polite and comfortable, distant and cordial. She knows it could have been more had she let it, she knows that she robbed a decent man of a fully realized union.

But now of course it’s over, and she’s filled with a painful regret. She hadn’t done him justice, she had been unfair to him, painfully so. She feels her eyes well with tears at the thought. Maggie’s hand finds hers and strong fingers like his squeeze her palm reassuringly. Jemma can’t find the words to voice her regret as she looks into the freshly dug grave.

Suddenly, she feels Fitz by her side, and the anxious breath she’s been holding rushes out of her with a whoosh. She’s suddenly exhausted and wants nothing more than to lie in bed next to him, to watch his still ethereal hands punctuate his sentences as they reminisce or discuss the latest scientific marvel. She wants him to take her away from here, from this place of sadness that brings her face to face with one her great failures.

But the thought makes her heart clench with guilt once more, she’d been a poor imitation of a wife, because she’d never been entirely able to forgive her husband for not being Fitz.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

10 years ago…

The trek had been arduous, especially with the increasingly angry ache in her knees. She can sense this might be her last climb of such a nature but if it’s to be her last she’s glad she’s ended on a high note. She smiles at the inadvertent pun as she looks across the glorious vista. The deep verdant green of the jungle running headlong into a peaceful turquoise sea. The gentle slope of small but quaint cottages serving only to accentuate the natural beauty of the place.   

“Where does it rank do you think?” he asks at her elbow

“Close to the top I reckon,” she says softly, there are a few other visitors milling about near the top and she’s long ago mastered the art of speaking to him unobtrusively in public.

“Better than Santorini?” he asks of her gold standard, she’d gone there to celebrate her 65th birthday and they had spent the night laughing and reminiscing over a bottle of Chianti.

“Mmmm,” she says worrying her lip, “Better than Cape Town at least I think,” she says decidedly.

“No way,” He says shaking his head with a decided no, “There were penguins on that beach Jem!”

“But look at that water,” she says reverentially gesturing to the view before her, “Better than…” and she stills as she mentally runs through all the great vistas she’s been privileged to see during her lifetime.

They flash before her like a beloved film she’s seen so many times that she’s committed it to memory. She mentally flicks through the memories slowly, savoring them like the last chocolate in a sampler. “I’ve been a lucky girl, far luckier than I deserve,” she says finally her voice a bit rough with emotion.

“You’ve deserved every bit of happiness, Jemma,” he replies automatically, stepping closer to her so that their shoulders would touch if they could. “But you’re absolutely right, it’s been a marvelous life.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Present Day…

“I lied to you…” he says finally, his eyes bluer than even she can remember, “It was just the once…and never again, but it’s a lie that’s been between us all along,” he says softly, his face still pressed against her palm. “You asked that first day, if I had just woken up in your room….and I said I had. But it wasn’t entirely true. Before I came there…there was a moment of intense peace…I couldn’t describe it if I tried but it was an option, a choice to move forward…”

“But you turned back instead,” she whispers, struck once more at the depth of his love, of his sacrifice. He gave up the world for her, and it seems the heavens too.

“I turned towards you,” he says with a shake of his head, as if that is the answer to everything. “I wasn’t sure…I didn’t know…”

“If I could manage a life without you?” she asks finally, “I might of,” she says tracing his jaw with her forefinger, brushing his eyebrows gently with her thumbs, “But I might not have too,” she admits finally.

“You’re the strongest person I know,” he whispers with a shake of his head, “But I don’t regret it, not a moment…if I’ve been able to help you live such a glorious life, even just a little, it’s been worth it.”

“Oh Fitz,” she whispers softly, “What next?”

“I’m not sure,” he replies slowly, “But I think we’ll find out soon.”

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Soon after…

She opens her eyes.

The light is glorious, its purity indescribable. She looks down at her hands and is unsurprised to see them free of the deformities which had plagued them in her final years. She flexes them slowly and is nearly overcome with the joy of being free of pain. Her skin is smooth and fine grained, and as she presses her fingers to her face and runs her hands down her neck she can tell that she’s young once more; wrinkles and sagged skin giving way to the firmness of youth. A gleeful bubble of mirth bubbles forth and she wants to hug herself, so she does. 

Her thoughts shift to her children, and with a surety that she finds just as difficult to describe as the view that greets her, she knows they will be fine. She marvels at how there is so much more…so much more than she ever knew.  She knows with every particle of her being that she’ll see them again…when it’s time.

Now there is only one thing that she needs. When she turns the object of her desire and all her fervent prayers is greeting her joyously, both arms waving above his beloved head.

She sobs in joy, in relief…and then she’s running towards him like the end of the romantic comedy that was never quite their life. But now they’re together again, finally. His arms wrapped loosely about her, a smile of pure delight gracing his face, one that she’s sure mirrors hers.

“Hullo,” he says as he rests his forehead on hers, “Fancy meeting a girl like you in a place like this.” His voice is light, as if all the sorrow and self-recriminations of their past have been left behind like their corporeal forms.

“You’re awfully handsome,” she says with a bubbly laugh, “More so now that you’ve regained some color in your skin,” her fingers entwining with his as she brings up their hands for a kiss.

“I know this is a bit forward. But I was hoping…dinner…you and me? Somewhere nice?” he says, unable to prevent himself from leaning down and stealing a kiss.

“Then perhaps breakfast?” she asks pressing her lips to his cheeks, his forehead, his eyebrows and eyelids, before kissing him again slowly and softly. It's better than she's remembered if that's even possible. It's everything. But, it's just one of a thousand kisses she’d imagined and missed. “Perhaps after that forever?”

There aren’t more words after that, at least not for a long while, but then again there is plenty of time…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This was a bit hopeful, a bit devastating to write. And as always I have to write my fears, but based on speculation I'm afraid this might be true. 
> 
> Yet, like Jemma I believe no life or love is wasted, and that you carry the people you love with you


End file.
